Mailinglist Archive: opensuse-edu (180 mails)

["Ian Lynch" <ianlynch@xxxxxxxx>]

> Government won't do it - they are already in the M$ pocket - look at the
> M$ gateway (oops - sorry about that, i meant he government gateway!).

I think you are being overly pessimistic. I hink that politicians can easily
be swayed. It needs selling to them in the right way. If they see saving
loadsa money = loadsa votes they will change, particularly if we offer it to
the opposition if the current lot aren't interested. I suspect most of the
cockups are more to do with the civil service and maintenance of the status
quo than with the politicians who simply don't understand it. If we just say
it ain't worth bothering because its hard it definitely won't happen. These
things are a war of attrition and we have to be prepared to keep persevering
what ever the setbacks.

> Yes we, in schools, could save money but teachers won't go for open
> source without training. believe me, they'll say that the pupils can't
> cope but the problem is not with the pupils.

I know quite a few schools who will go open source and will use the savings
for training. That should be part of the strategy. Once we get a critical
mass and show that the NC can be covered - that's what is statutory - at
much lower cost more will follow. Ok some might take a long time, look how
long RISC OS has persisted but all we need to stimulate the software market
is a significant minority then there will be even less of an argument
against.

> if we want this to work, and we want schools to go opensource, then we,
> the open source community, are going to have to provide training
> materials, faq's and example lessons which lead to defined National
> Curriculum Levels. When we can do this THEN we can provide a total
> solution to the Microshaft problem....

Yes we have to do that but we have to do the other things as well.

--
IanL

> alan
>
> Ian Lynch wrote:
> >
> > My experience is that the Microsoft licensing for operating systems in
> > particular is a complete minefield. Even the distributors don't seem to
> > understand the codes etc. If dealers and distributors find this complex
I
> > should think the majority of end-users have many unintentional
infringements
> > of the licensing rules. Its fairly straightforward with a lot of the
> > curriculum applications that simply say you have a site licence for this
> > programme at £x. Its the operating systems that cause the problems. The
real
> > snags are all the different prices of OEM, multiple license packs, the
range
> > of operating systems and a range of rules for upgrades, for servers
> > concurrent users, client access licences, multiple server licences etc
etc.
> > In fact I should also think that quite a lot of people end up paying
more
> > than they need for a whole host of reasons. From a reseller point of
view,
> > the sooner we have one open source operating system to deal with the
better.
> > Microsoft's reply will be that schools should go for schools' agreement
> > which costs something like £40 per machine per year but a) some eligible
> > machines won't run the latest software so schools end up paying for
upgrades
> > they will never do and agreement doesn't cover the basic operating
system
> > because M$ assume every machine bought has one of their operating
systems on
> > it so the SA only covers upgrades. Mind, I can't see that M$ would be
stupid
> > enough to take all schools to task. The backlash in terms of bad
publicity
> > would be the fastest accelerator to Open Source I can imagine. Most
schools
> > don't deliberately pirate software and most seem to be becoming
increasingly
> > fed up with the cost of Microsoft.  Take a largish secondary school with
400
> > machines. They probably pay around £60 per OEM Windows on buying each
> > machine - more like £100 if its Windows2000 and let's say they have
School's
> > agreement at £40 per machine. That's £24,000 and then £16,000 per year
just
> > for what they can have free using Linux and StarOffice and a few odds
and
> > ends. If they want thin clients using Citrix its another £80-£130 per
> > machine. If Government targets for pupil computer ratios are to be met,
this
> > has to be replicated all over the country. 4000 secondary schools and
that's
> > £50-60m on M$ agreement alone. Double it for primary and its of the
order of
> > £100m a year in schools alone and that ignores any thin client costs.
This
> > doesn't take into account the savings that would also be made by using
thin
> > clients and the reduction in maintenance and technician support required
so
> > I would say we could at least double the savings on that basis alone.
Tell
> > your local MP that you have a way of saving £100-200m of taxpayers money
per
> > year in schools alone and I should think at least £1 billion nationally
in
> > the public sector if the Government will make a bit of effort to promote
> > Open Source. Most of this money will be re-used and a lot of it will go
on
> > better support and training locally thus boosting the small business
sector,
> > improving the technological literacy of the nation and strengthening the
> > economy as a whole rather than increasing our imports bill from the USA.
> > Write to your MP now and copy it to Estelle Morris at the Department for
> > Education and Skills!
> >
> > --
> > IanL
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Frank Shute <shute@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > To: Schools List <suse-linux-uk-schools@xxxxxxxx>
> > Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2001 8:50 PM
> > Subject: [suse-linux-uk-schools] software in schools/piracy
> >
> > > There's quite an interesting article at Salon about how US schools are
> > > being hunted down and fined for using pirated commercial software &
> > > how they are reacting:
> > >
> > >
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/07/10/microsoft_school/index.html
> > >
> > > Are UK schools going to be next in the line of fire? I've heard that
> > > controlling licences and the paperwork involved is a major time
> > > consumer and administrative nightmare for schools. Anybody got
> > > any personal experience?
> > >
> > > The real shocker was getting fined $50000 for 100 odd illegal copies
> > > of MSDOS. I'm sure there are plenty of schools in this country who
> > > have many illegal copies of DOS running under Windows without
> > > realising it.
> > >
> > > Anybody been investigated/fined yet?
> > >
> > > --
> > >
> > >  Frank
> > >
> > >  *-------*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-------*
> > >  |  Boroughbridge  |  Tel: 01423 323019  | PGP keyID: 0xC0B341A3 |
> > >  *-------*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-------*
> > >                http://www.esperance-linux.co.uk/
> > >
> > >
> > > --
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> >
> > --
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>
> --
>
> -----------------------------------------------------
> Alan Harris
> Network Manager
> Bryngwyn School
>
> Tel   : 01554 750661
> Fax   : 01554 758255
> E-mail: alanh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
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